Gone Girl

I chose to read Gone Girl since they were filming it in Cape Girardeau (where I received my undergraduate degree).

This book is interesting in how it switches authors each chapter. It starts with the writer being Nick Dunne. His entries are in chronological order from the day that his wife went missing until the end of the book. Nick’s chapters are very simple to follow in this manner. He grew up in Missouri with his family and moved out to New York to start his journalism career.

The even chapters of Gone Girl are written by Amy, Nick’s wife. She grew up as the daughter of two well-known writers that created a book series all about her called Amazing Amy. Her beginning chapters are all about the past: how Nick and Amy met in New York, married and were the perfect couple everyone was envious of, moved to Missouri to help his struggling parents, and now have a struggling marriage.

Since they both lost their New York jobs from the move and Amy’s family had money from their book series, Nick opened a bar once he moved back home. Nick held a lot of responsibilities at the bar. After his mother lost the battle to cancer he still had his father’s daily struggles with memory loss and escapes from his assisted living center. You can see how Nick could be a little high-strung.

It was the couple’s fifth wedding anniversary when Nick woke up to an empty bed. Every year for their anniversary, Amy planned a scavenger hunt to remind Nick of their love for one another and highlight inside jokes and memories they created that year. The police found the first clue, that Nick would have found that morning, and allowed him to search his scavenger hunt from Amy. In the meantime, the cops investigated the situation further, hoping it would spring up more clues on her disappearance.

The police force claimed Nick murdered his wife since he had a lack of public speaking skills and looked very awkward and happy during each interview. Nick also had no alibi from the time she went missing and the neighbor, who was the last to see Amy, claimed he constantly threatened her.

According to Nick, other suspects are high school and grade school friends of Amy that threatened her years ago. The police don’t seem to be buying his story so Nick is left town to investigate these suspects on his own.

Will we find Amy? Did someone commit a murder; if so, who? Visit the spoiler page to see how the book unravels!

*Note- This post continues the writing from the Book Summaries page. Please read for previous details.*

Nick continued his search for Amy, knowing in the back of his mind that she is still alive. He followed her scavenger hunt all around town – leading him to his father’s house, his sister’s house, Hannibal, and his office at work. All of these are places that he and Amy shared a special memory, but he also shared these places with another girl. Yes, you read that correctly. Nick Dunne had a young, hot girlfriend on the side. She was a student of his that he had been having an affair with. Suddenly, the clues make complete sense. Amy knew about the other woman and she was making him pay for it.

As Amy’s sections of the chapters progress, we quickly find out that she is actually hiding out in a cabin, paying with cash that she has saved up for the past year. She bought a car with cash and hid it out in St. Louis for months prior to her disappearance. She wanted to prove a point to Nick that she is not a woman to be messed with.

Nick investigated the past followers of Amy that she claimed stalked her and raped her. The both denied these claims and said how she tricked them into being seen as criminals. The girl who “stalked” Amy actually was talked into cutting her hair, buying new clothes and pretending to be Amy by none other than Amy herself. As for the “rapist”, she tricked him into having sex with her (consensual on both parts) and made him go harder, proceeded to make rope burn marks on her wrists and turned him in for rape. These each were supposedly because Amy wasn’t entertaining them and they were about to move on. When Nick found this out, he confidently knew she was sabotaging him for having an affair.

As time passed, Amy started to run out of money and needed some help. She called on a friend that she claimed was obsessed with her years ago. He supplied her housing in his spare lake house and vowed to keep her secret (considering she was a national news story at this point). After a few days and undying affection from her male friend, Amy was tired of the man and truly believed that Nick was sorry from the news reports she had watched. She decided to repeat history and planned a fake rape. When her and the man finished having consensual sex, Amy drugged him with sleeping pills then proceeded to stab him to death in his sleep.

After Amy came to the police, her new story became clear. Clearly Amy did not run away; she was kidnapped and raped by a man who used to be obsessed about her and she was lucky to get away. Nick was furious to see her back home after he had been portrayed as a murderer in front of the whole nation. Not long after her arrival home, Amy discovered Nick’s apologies on television were just a tactic to get her to come back home. Therefore, Amy needed another ploy to get Nick to stay with her. Years before all this started, Nick submitted sperm into the hospital to be tested since they were “having trouble” getting pregnant. Amy went to the hospital used this sperm to impregnate herself. She was officially pregnant with a baby boy which Nick had always wanted.

The two stayed together under the same roof for the pregnancy, trying to fix their marriage and learn to trust one another again. It was their sixth anniversary (iron) coming up when the book was finalizing. She asked why he was so wonderful to her and he replied “Because I feel sorry for you…Because every morning you have to wake up and be you.”

The book closed saying that Nick wanted the last word, and with reference to iron being the sixth anniversary present, I can only think that he killed her with an iron gun. Any thoughts? This ending left me wondering…